Latitude teaser

I have to tell you all about the fantastic weekend we had at Latitude! There was music, of course, but there was also theatre, literary talks, comedy acts, film and play! I'll be back later with a proper post. For now, I'll leave you with a photo of the main stage before the fun began!

PS. Thanks so much for your comments on the unveiling and my 12 months of being 30.  I feel I'm opening up a bit more in the blog and your support is very important! You rock!

PPS. I came back from Latiude full of inspiration and ideas, some of which affect this blog, so as they say, watch this space...

12 months of being 30

As you all know (because I've been talking about it endlessly!), I turned 30 last month, on 17th June. I do think that turning 30 is an important milestone, and a perfect chance to reevaluate your life, think about what you've done and achieved and how close you are to where you want to be. I was trying to find a way to document my year when I found  365 days of being 30. Erin is doing a piece of art every day during the year she's 30 and posting them here. I've decided to copy get inspiration from her project and start recording my own year of being 30. So, every month, on the 17th, I'll post art journaling pages, writing, photos or whatever reflects what I've been doing and feeling during that month. 

In this month's pages I can definitely see a theme of doors opening, and the feeling that I'm walking somewhere, taking small steps towards a better place. My pages are surprisingly calm, which defintely doesn't reflect the month I've had (busy, busy), but maybe the place where I want to get.

PS. I've scheduled this for the 17th, so by the time you read this, I'll be at Latitude Festival! I'll tell you all about it when I come back and I'll try to twitter from there. Check my tweets here!

Corner view: The unveiling...

You've seen bits of me before... like my feet (and beautiful yellow shoes) and the back of my head...

You've seen me hiding behind a camera or my sunglasses....

For this week's corner view, we're all unveiling...

Nice to meet you! If we're in Spain, I'll give you two kisses; if we're in South America, it'll be only one kiss on the cheek; and if we're in England, there'll be a handshake, unless you want to prove you are cool and hip, in which case, we go back to the two kisses.

Corner view is organized by lovely Jane (go and see her unveiling) and there are more corner view unveilings going on here:

jane, ladybug-zen, ian, bonnie, esti, sophie, cele, modsquad, caitlin, joyce, ani, kim, a day that is dessert, natsumi, epe, kaylovesvintage, trinsch, c.t., jeannette, outi, schanett, ritva, francesca, state of bliss, jennifer, dana, denise, cabrizette, bohemia girl, dianna, isabelle, amber, a girl in the yellow shoes, mister e, janis, kari, jgy, skymring, elizabeth, audrey, allison, lise, cate, mon, victoria, crescent moon, erin, otli, amy, ida, caroline, lisa, dorte, kimmie, la lune dans le ciel, nicola, malo, vanessa, britta, virgina, april, b, kyndale samantha, karen, kristina, dorit, goldensunfamily, sophie, janet, mcgillicutty, desiree, di, travelingmama, aimee, sunnymama, amanda, ali, jenell, guusje, britta, juanita, pamela, inna, daan, myrtille, cris, ibb, susi, jodi, lily, gillian, jeanette, athena, pienduzz, latisha, clairette, kelleyn

A creative summer

At the beginning of June I took one of Rachel Denbow's art journalling classes. We had to think about how we wanted to make the most of the coming summer and do some art journaling about it. These are the first three pages I made (more to come soon!). This was the first time I did art journaling, so, please, be nice :)

Prompted by The Fragrant Muse, who also took the course, I've recently came back to them and been thinking about summer. When I was a child summer meant time to play, no responsibilities, no homework, nothing to do until September. Although I can't exactly recreate that anymore (I need to work, after all), at least, I want to bring back the fun, and that feeling of having all the time in the world that it's so difficult to experience once you grow up. As I said in my pages, I want to make things, I want to spend time outside, I want to go for picnics and read on the grass, I want to dance, I want to write, I want to eat strawberries in the garden....

So these are just some of the things that I've planned and I'm looking forward to this summer:

Latitude Festival! It's next weekend and we are ready for three days of music, film, poetry, literary conversations, alternative theatre and lots and lots of fun!!! We went to Latitude two years ago, when it was still pretty small and unknown and absolutely loved it. I've been reassured that despite the fact that it's quickly growing into a big Festival, it still retains its charm. I remember thinking after the last time that I had seen more cultural acts in three days than during the rest of the year. I seriously CANNOT wait!

Jewelry workshop: I'm taking another silver jewelry workshop with a friend at the beginning of August. It'll be only the two of us and we're going to the artist's workshop to make a piece each. I'm going to make a huge pendant!

Workshops at The Make Lounge! I've been wanting to go to one of their workshops since Rachel took a bookbinding class there. They are not organizing any more bookbinding workshops, but I'm going to learn to crochet better than this and I'm going to make bags! By the way, Decor8 blogged about The Make Lounge today.

And of course, I'm looking forward to many picnics and days in the park! I really need the so-called heatwave (We call 32 degrees a nice summer day where I come from!) to come back.

In wonderland

There was a garden.

There were flamingo-looking umbrellas.  

There were tea mugs...

.... and some very tempting tea cakes. 

Oxford transformed itself into Wonderland to celebrate Alice's day on Saturday. There were celebrations all over town, and we chose to have a picnic in the Botanical Gardens, and watched a representation of the story.

I'm feeling a strong urge to read the book again, and I can't wait to see what Tim Burton makes of the classic. It looks wonderfully scary!

Randomness and links

Hello people! I'm still here, even tough I haven't been posting much, and not only because I've been feeling shy! Work is absolutely crazy, and there are other things going on in my life at the moment that I'll have to tell you about (good things that are making me feel all grown up!). I don't have the energy right now, but I'll soon be back with some planned posts about my awesomeness (because you know I AM awesome), my diary wreckage and, most important of all, my first dressmaking project. In the meantime, I'll leave you with a random list of random links.

Do you want to see some dreamy photos? Go to the Daydreaming images in the Rebecca Miller's portfolio. How would you represent daydreaming?

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I'm still obsessed with yellow and I've found a couple of cool things in the blogospehre lately:

A yellow room from This is glamorous. Have you noticed the little office? Want.It.

And this lovely dress from my new favourite shop, Ruche. Go to their blog for more.

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I'm sure you know Kerri Smith, the author of Wreck this journal. She posted this on her blog a while ago and I really want to remember. I always resist when I'm doing something outside my comfort zone, but, of course, those things I do turn up to be great most of the time and make for fantastic memories.

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Have you seen this brilliant project about little people in the streets of London? It reminds me of a cartoon I used to watch when I was a kid, The littles. Do you remember it? More on the little people blog.

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This is a lovely modern love moment that I saw in Le Love sometime ago. I just think it's perfect!

My mobile phone quit as I tried to let my wife know that I was caught up in traffic and would be late for our anniversary dinner. I wrote a message on my laptop asking other motorists to call her, printed it on a portable ink jet and taped it to my rear windshield. When I finally arrived home, my wife gave me a the longest kiss ever. "I really think you love me" she said, "at least 70 people called me and told me so.

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I found this poster in Naturally Nina. What can I say? My thoughts exactly.

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I'm loving the Disposable Memory project. Disposable cameras are released into the world for people to take some photos, pass them on, and finally send them back to the organizers. When we were in South America last year, my boyfriend and I used to have disposable cameras competitions from time to time. See the results here and here. And this is me, in Cuenca, Ecuador, snapping the winning photo in our second competition!

Random me

Since blog camp, I've been finding it a bit hard to blog. I think it's the realization that, as Polly said, there are, indeed, real people behind the blogs. People who will like what I write, or won't, who may understand or not, who are sometimes in a receptive good mood, or in a silly negative one. I know what you're thinking, this is silly, because, of course I kind of knew all this before. Maybe, but now it's real.

So, to ease me back into it, I'll start with some randomness about me, me, me! Ali tagged me on the 7 things meme, so I have to tell you 7 random things about myself. Here they are:

1. I don't cook. Like never. I really wished I could cook, I wished I found it relaxing, I wish I was patient enough to do properly. I love to entertain, I love to create a home wherever I am. But cooking is the one thing I won't do. I'd, basically, rather use my time for other things. Lucky for me, boyfriend cooks and enjoys it! He even makes his own bread!

2. I have a collection of mugs from most of the places I've been to and I buy a new one in every place I visit. I can't remember how this started but I now have a huge collection. Most of them are at my parents, waiting for me to get a house where they can live permanently.

3. I look much younger than I really am. Sometimes people still ask for my ID when I try to buy alcohol or get into a club! And I AM 30! Although, as people have been saying since I started complaining about it, this would be a good thing when I turn 40!

4. I'm also quite short. But I decided long time ago that this was "cute" and got over it.

5. I love eating bread on its own. As a child, I could eat a whole baguette before we sat down for lunch, and my Mum had to buy two every day.

6. I used to be able to read more than one book at once without getting confused... but no more. I have to stick to two maximum, and even that gets confusing at times.

7. I don't have a TV. I know most of you know this already, but RWP (Real World People) get so surprised when they learn this, that I thought I'd throw it in here.

Corner view: Music, Oxford, UK

One of the things I really like about Oxford is how many shows are always going on. Theatre, comedy... and of course, music! Walking around the town last week, I noticed many posters for different music spectacles.

From reggae, always present in Cowley Road, the most multicultural part of Oxford (which doesn't really mean it's that multicultural):

 

To classical music in the Hollywell Music Room in the centre:  

With anything you can imagine in between: 

 

For more musical corner views around the world, visit Spain Daily.

Blog Camp Bloggers

You've heard about Blog Camp, you've seen the previews, many of the preparations and some of the details in the Blog Camp blog, as well as first impressions in the camper's blogs here, here, here, here and here. Julie has already started posting a series on what happened, so I'm not going to do the same, unless I discover that we have completely different versions!
Blog Camp 1 was the first time that I'd met any fellow bloggers in real life and I jumped at the chance from the beginning. But then, I got nervous, first about what they would think of me, and then, just a little bit, about what they'd be like.
Bee had told me that, in her experience, bloggers tend to be like their blogging voice. This was true... and, at the same time, it wasn't. Having the person in front of you instantly changes your idea of them, or at least it did for me. Suddenly, they weren't only words and photos on a screen. They were people, with their personal gestures, voices and mannerisms. I very quickly adjusted, we all did, and commented on how we all sounded very much like our blogs but later we wondered: Do we really sound like our blogs? Or have we changed our preconceptions of each other in light of the real us?
Were there any surprises? Only good ones. Ours was a eclectic blogger group. Some have been blogging for a long time, while others have just started. Some will post every day and will touch lots of different topics, others will post when they feel they have something to share about a particular book or film. Some talk about life, others about hobbies, pets, or relationships. Some are positive and others are sarcastic. Blogging shows many sides of you, but rarely the whole picture... You choose certain topics to blog about, and we of course all go through phases where we have less time or less energy for blogging.
So, yes, we discovered that Extranjera was "actually quite pleasant" (her words) and could crochet and knit, and that Polly is a model in the making, and much more funny in real life. Who knew that Seaside Girl would actually like to marry a Danish man and that Kristina would come sans Vigdis? Julocka? Actually, no big surprises there, she really is like her blog!
I'm not saying that you can't get to know someone through their blogging, because you certainly can, and we did before Blog Camp and we'll continue to do so. But you see many other sides of someone face to face. Which is, of course, why there is a Blog Camp UK in the making, and a Blog Camp 2 in Denmark to come!

I only exist when I'm online or at Blog Camp

There were bloggers... they all were like their blogs... but even better!!! We did talk a lot about our blogging and real personalities. Are we like our blogs? More on this tomorrow...

Not the best photo, but I wrote: I only exist when I'm online or at Blog Camp on Julie's table. We all left our mark! Another one:

And, of course, the real reason why I wanted to go to Denmark:

If you want to know how the experiment went, we're taking questions over here. I'll tell you something, there is a blog camp UK in the making so... you guessed it! We loved it!!!